


Another Set of Eyes

by Twice_before_Friday



Series: October? No, I think you mean Whumptober [18]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Emotional Whump, Fear, Gen, Hiding, Malcolm Bright Needs a Hug, Paranoia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:36:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27081301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twice_before_Friday/pseuds/Twice_before_Friday
Summary: Prompt No 18. PANIC! AT THE DISCOPanic Attacks | Phobias |ParanoiaSomeone is watching him.He has no proof, no evidence to back up the claim, but hefeelsit.
Series: October? No, I think you mean Whumptober [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1947595
Comments: 11
Kudos: 52
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Another Set of Eyes

Someone is watching him.

He has no proof, no evidence to back up the claim, but he _feels_ it. The little hairs on the back of his neck stand on end at the oddest of times. At a crime scene earlier in the week, he would swear someone from the crowd of onlookers was more interested in him than they were in the general pandemonium of the gory mess of bodies left behind by a spree killer.

But when he turned to look, he couldn't actually _find_ the person in the crowd.

In his loft last night, when he was clipping himself into his restraints, it happened again; that unmistakable feeling of someone watching him, examining him like a specimen under a microscope. It stole his sleep away (not that he gets much anyways) as he kept looking out the window, searching for the gaze that he was sure was on him.

He gave up on sleeping altogether at 3:30am when the thought occurred to him that, perhaps, whoever was watching him wasn't outside his apartment at all. Just maybe, they were watching him from inside. He unclipped his restraints and padded silently to the cabinets that house his weapons collection, grabbing a double-blade viking axe and holding tight with both hands as he crept through every inch of his loft, looking for a possible intruder.

After he discovered his loft was clear, he spent the next three hours tearing apart everything from furniture to lighting fixtures in search of the surveillance equipment he was certain must have been hidden inside.

He found nothing.

After hours of low-grade fear thrumming through his body and not a wink of sleep, he's feeling shaky and raw when he arrives at the precinct in the morning. And it only gets worse as the day goes on. He's looking over his shoulder, literally, every few minutes as he sits at his desk, convinced someone is standing behind him, poised to attack.

"Hey, Bright, have you—"

He nearly jumps out of his skin when Dani comes up behind him, her gaze buried in the open folder in her hand until Malcolm jolts so hard it knocks the plastic cup of pens off his desk, ballpoints flying everywhere. Her head jerks up at his startled reaction, eyebrows shooting to her hairline as she takes in his panting breaths and trembling hand. "Woah. You good?"

"I'm fine," Malcolm rushes to say as he drops down to the ground, trying to corral the pens as they roll in every direction. "I'm fine," he repeats, a little quieter this time, and it's unclear if he's saying it to her or to himself.

"Bright, what is up with you lately?" Dani says using the tip of her boot to stop a runaway bic. "You're kinda weirder than your usual level of weird."

The tone is laced with more concern than censure, but Malcolm still flushes and looks away in embarrassment. He hates allowing the team to see him at his weakest, and right now, he's so frightened he's jumping at shadows. He knows he's walking a fine line with the team as it is — they never wanted him here in the first place — so showing off just how unstable he can be might just spell the end of his consultancy with the NYPD.

He's not sure he could survive that.

"I'm fine," he pushes to his feet with a smile that's just a little too big, a little too bright. "Just working the case. Searching for similarities."

Four bodies have turned up, seemingly unrelated and with different causes of death, but a tox screen showed the same unknown compound in each of their bloodstreams. If it weren't for the odd rash that all four had at the base of their throats, they wouldn't have even made a connection, wouldn't have known to perform an autopsy to look for a common cause.

"Right." Dani purses her lips in disbelief but holds out the file in her hands. "I was about to ask if you saw Edrisa's workup of that chemical compound in the vics." When Malcolm shakes his head, she carries on, "She's still not entirely sure what it is, but it looks like it may have been designed to trigger a psychotic break, or at the very least, induce hallucinations and paranoia."

Makes sense, he thinks. Two of the victims were run-of-the-mill suicides, one accidentally ran into traffic, and one threw himself from a window after throwing a fit at his office. If they were hallucinating, it could explain all four deaths.

Malcolm nods and opens his mouth to speak, but then he sees eyes watching him from between the slats of the conference room blinds. And not just one set, like he'd been expecting. There's dozens. They're all watching him, waiting to attack.

He feels the blood drain from his face, the ground drop from beneath his feet.

"What do you want!?" he screams, startling Dani enough that she drops the file and stares at him in shock. Suddenly the entire precinct is staring at him and it's too much. He can't seem to suck in enough air and yanks at his tie, trying to loosen the noose from around his neck but grabs at his shirt as well, yanking at the collar.

"Fuck," Dani whispers as she reaches forward to pop the top button of his shirt. "Gil!"

Gil was already rushing from his office, drawn by Malcolm's shout and is nearly beside them when she calls out. Dani pulls her hands back when Malcolm flinches violently away from her touch and turns to Gil.

"He's got the rash, the same ones our vics have. I think he's been dosed with whatev—" her words are cut off as Malcolm barrels through them and makes a break for the door, moving so quickly and so suddenly that they don't even have time to try and stop him.

"Bright!" Gil's shout follows him down the hall but he needs to get out, get away from all the eyes that are following him.

He bursts through the precinct doors and out into the street but it's even worse outside than it was in the station. Thousands of windows look down at him and behind each pain of glass is another set of eyes, trained on him.

He pulls at his hair and screams, wanting nothing more than to get away but he has no idea how to escape the threatening glares that follow his every move. He needs to get somewhere safe, somewhere they won't find him. Somewhere they don't know about.

~~~

Gil gets the frantic call from Jessica less than half an hour later. Apparently Malcolm showed up at the Milton family home, completely out of his mind and going on and on about a safe space, somewhere no one would look.

He's barricaded himself in the basement.

Gil takes a deep breath — the kid is still in trouble but at least they know where he is now — and grabs Powell, telling her to call for an ambulance to Jessica's house and then call Edrisa to find out what the hell they need to do to counter the effects of whatever Malcolm's been dosed with.

They're halfway to Jessica's before Dani finishes calling for an ambulance and dials the quirky medical examiner, putting her on speaker.

"Hullo, Detective!" Edrisa says excitedly, "I was just about to call you. It appears as though the victim's prescription medication was tampered with, replaced with the unknown compound. I'd suggest checking if they all fill their prescriptions at the same pharmacy. Now, the compound itself is fascinating! It appears to be—"

Dani cuts her off before she can start delving into the technical details and breaking down chemical formulas. "Bright's been dosed."

Edrisa goes suddenly silent, not even a breath coming through the speaker until she asks, "Is he…"

"We're on our way to him now and the paramedics are meeting us there. What does he need?" Dani says, keeping her voice steady but firm in an effort to wrangle in Edrisa's fear.

"Um, I mean, I still don't have a complete understanding of the compound yet, but if he appears to be acutely psychotic," Edrisa voice cracks around the words and Dani and Gil both know that applying those words to Malcolm is painful for the ME to consider. "Then I'd suggest a combination of intramuscular haloperidol and lorazepam."

"Good work, Edrisa," Gil says as he weaves in and out of traffic and blows through red lights. "Keep analyzing the compound and see if you can find anything else. We'll keep you posted once we get him."

They arrive before the ambulance, and Jessica is waiting at the front door, looking absolutely harried as she paces the front stoop with her hands on her hips.

"Gil, what the hell happened?" she asks the moment they step foot from the car, equal parts worry and fear colouring the words.

Gil gently pushes past her into the house, heading directly to the basement and explaining on the way, "He's been dosed with something. I'll explain everything once we get him."

Gil ends up having to break the basement door off its hinges to get through and then the three of them are rushing down the stairs. Jessica and Dani go directly to Martin's old workroom, assuming he's headed for the hidden tunnels, but Gil continues down the hall, praying he's wrong with every step he takes.

The trunk is in the middle of the floor when he turns the corner and Gil's heart plummets, _knowing_ that Malcolm is inside before he even reaches the antique box.

Sucking in a steadying breath, Gil reaches out to lift the lid.

Malcolm is inside, shaking and crying, whispering, "They can't see me," over and over and over. With his eyes shut tight and his hands clapped over his ears, Malcolm doesn't seem aware that the lid has even been lifted.

It breaks Gil's heart, but Malcolm's not trying to hurt himself and he's not trying to run away, so Gil simply lowers himself next to the trunk, ready to help should Malcolm need him. He brings a finger to his lips as Jessica and Dani round the corner, and gestures for Dani to meet the paramedics and fill them in on what Edrisa suggested for treatment.

Jessica, meanwhile, joins Gil on the floor next to the trunk, silent tears streaming down her face as she watches her son, curled up in the trunk like that poor girl all those years ago. She instinctively understands Gil's decision to leave him be, not willing to make things worse when Malcolm is clearly in a delicate situation.

And so they wait, listening to Malcolm's terrified whispers and broken whimpers until the paramedics can come and administer the medication that, hopefully, will ratchet down the fear that's threatening to consume him.

It does, thank God, and Gil and Dani help gently lift a nearly unconscious Malcolm from the trunk and set him on the stretcher.

It takes no time at all to load Malcolm into the ambulance, a tear-stained Jessica climbing in beside him, and soon, Gil is closing the door behind them, watching the ambulance drive away.

They'll head to the hospital as soon as they can, but as he looks at Dani, he sees the same determination in her eyes that he feels inside.

They have a killer to catch. And they are _not_ letting him slip through their fingers.


End file.
